## Facts

- Fairfax County and the City of Falls Church joined with other jurisdictions in Virginia, Maryland, and the District of Columbia to create the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) through an interstate compact to provide regional mass transit.
- In an earlier case involving substantially similar parties and WMATA’s initial financing plan, the Virginia court held that Fairfax County and Falls Church could not constitutionally agree to underwrite WMATA operating deficits because that created “debt or indebtedness” subject to local debt limits.
- After that ruling, WMATA changed its financing approach and presented new agreements that the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors and the Falls Church governing body approved.
- The revised agreements removed any obligation for the County or City to guarantee or cover WMATA operating deficits.
- Instead, each locality agreed to make annual “transit service payments” to WMATA as consideration for transit service, measured by a formula that depended on actual use and service:
  - 1¼ cents for each “Transit Trip” taken by a resident of the locality during the fiscal year (as determined by WMATA), plus
  - 20 cents for each “Train Mile” operated within the locality during the fiscal year.
- The payment duty was tied to WMATA’s furnishing of transit service; the amount was computed annually based on ridership and train operations, rather than fixed in advance as a deficit guaranty.
- WMATA planned to finance construction primarily through issuance of net revenue bonds, with payment coming from system revenues and the service-payment structure described above.
- After the new agreements were approved by the local governing bodies, the Fairfax County Executive (Carlton C. Massey) and the Falls Church City Manager (Harry E. Wells) refused to execute them.
- Fairfax County and Falls Church filed separate original petitions for writs of mandamus in the Supreme Court of Appeals of Virginia, asking the court to compel their respective officials to sign the revised agreements.

## Issues

1. Whether the revised WMATA service agreements required Fairfax County and the City of Falls Church to incur “debt or indebtedness” within the meaning of Virginia’s constitutional local debt limitations (and, as to the City, its charter limitation).
2. Whether obligations to make annually measured, service-conditioned payments (based on transit trips and train miles) are outside constitutional debt limits because they operate as payment for services rendered rather than as a binding guaranty of deficits or a pledge of general credit.
3. If the agreements were constitutional and duly authorized by the governing bodies, whether mandamus could compel the county executive and city manager to execute the agreements.

## Decision

- The court held that the revised WMATA agreements did not create unconstitutional “debt or indebtedness” for Fairfax County or the City of Falls Church.
- The court distinguished the earlier invalid agreements because the revised plan eliminated deficit underwriting and replaced it with payments conditioned on transit service and calculated by annual measures of use and train operations.
- The court granted the requested writs of mandamus, requiring the county executive and city manager to execute the revised agreements on behalf of their respective localities.

## Legal Principles

- Constitutional limits on local “debt or indebtedness” target binding obligations that commit a locality’s general credit or require future taxation in a manner equivalent to borrowing.
- A locality’s agreement to pay for services can fall outside debt limits when the obligation is contingent on performance (services actually provided) and the amount is determined periodically based on measurable service or usage.
- Removing a deficit guaranty feature can change the constitutional analysis: an agreement to cover another entity’s operating deficits may create forbidden debt, while a service-payment arrangement measured by use and conditioned on service may not.
- When a governing body lawfully authorizes an agreement and an executive officer’s duty to sign is ministerial rather than discretionary, mandamus is an available remedy to compel execution.

## Conclusion

Board of Supervisors of Fairfax County v. Massey upheld revised WMATA service agreements that replaced deficit guarantees with annually calculated payments based on transit trips by residents and train miles within the locality, payable only in return for transit service; because the obligations did not amount to constitutional “debt or indebtedness,” the court issued mandamus directing the county executive and city manager to execute the agreements.


Board of Supervisors of Fairfax County v. Massey, 173 S.E.2d 869 (1970)